Thursday, CART announced that it will adopt IRL engine standards for the 2003 season. But like most CART decisions, it might be too little too late. The bottom line is that a lack of vision, pathetic planning, arrogance and politics have put a serious power outage in the FedEx Championship for 2003 and beyond.

As it stands today, Toyota, Honda and Ford will honor their contracts and compete in the 2002 CART season. After that, all bets are off. Honda made it clear this weekend that it is out, while Ford has been warning people for months that it won't be around come 2003.

That leaves Toyota. Last spring the company announced it would begin building engines for the Indianapolis 500 and IRL in 2003. Two weeks ago, it told CART it would no longer make turbocharged engines after next year. That's when CART's car owners finally figured out it was time to make a decision about a new engine rule.

But, in typical CART fashion, this was done in a panic, like a last-minute term paper.

Because CART dragged its feet and let the deadline for 2003 rules pass last March, Toyota took the initiative and opted to go with the IRL's normally-aspirated formula. Competing at Indianapolis had always been Toyota's priority, and this move, obviously, assured that of happening.

Toyota, however, left open the possibility of continuing its involvement with CART once the organization decided on a new engine formula, but only if things made "business and marketing" sense.

Even though all three of CART's engine manufacturers had discussed dropping turbocharged motors and switching to IRL specs because of the cost and to make it easier to compete at Indy, CART treated the issue of its 2003 engine formula with no sense of urgency.

And there also appeared to be an understanding that Honda and Ford would continue to provide turbo power for the 27-28 cars in 2003 before CART changed engine rules in 2004.

"Honda and Ford understood that if Toyota went away, we would have to take up the slack and split up the Toyota teams for 2003. We were prepared to do that," said Tom Elliott, president of American Honda. "But CART continues to disregard the rule book and any input from its manufacturers. This is the second engine change in the last 90 days, and our frustration is with CART. It's the timing of this thing, not the formula."

Why did CART suddenly decide to announce an engine change for 2003?

"CART has to create an environment where it knows what it's doing and where it's going," replied CEO Joe Heitzler, who is taking the heat for something that should have been handled a year ago by CART's ex-technical chief, Kirk Russell, and the franchise board.

What this decision came down to was clout. Bobby Rahal had already alerted his fellow competitors that Ford was likely leaving following 2002 -- so the longest-standing engine manufacturer in the CART series had been scratched from the thought process.

That left Honda and Toyota, the two most valuable commodities in the CART paddock.

Besides powering the past five CART champions, Honda built the awesome oval track at Motegi, Japan, sponsors two races (Laguna Seca and Australia) and spends big bucks in television and newspaper ads that promoted CART. Honda even went so far as to produce a TV commercial that promoted CART's series sponsor, Federal Express.

True, Honda consistently stated its opposition to dropping turbocharged engines for the lower tech IRL-type motors. But still, before the embarrassing "popoff valve controversy" last summer and this latest knee-jerk reaction by CART, there was every reason to believe Honda would stick around.

"This series has been good for Honda," said Elliott. "We like racing in Canada, Japan, Germany, Mexico and England."

But, as powerful and successful as Honda is, Toyota carries even more clout. Recently, CART closed down the Indy Lights series and signed a long-term agreement with Toyota Atlantic, which is now the top rung of CART's ladder system.

Toyota is also the title sponsor at Long Beach and presenting sponsor at Nazareth, Michigan and the California 500 at Fontana. Like Honda, it also has a large budget for newspaper, magazine and television advertising.

The players
What hasn't figured into this equation, at least publicly, are the plans of Chip Ganassi and Roger Penske.

It's believed Ganassi, who captured four straight CART titles with Honda before switching to Toyota in 2000, already has been selected to head Toyota's IRL test team for 2002 and is going to field a full-time IRL effort in 2003.

Target, the longtime partner and sponsor of Ganassi, also has grown weary of CART's increasing international schedule and, despite its success in the FedEx Championship, longs for more exposure in America. The IRL has 15 races slated for 2002 -- all in the USA.

Penske, currently with Honda but a cod-lock to be with Toyota in 2003, has expressed his disgust with CART's policy making (dropping his former tracks at Nazareth and Michigan and adding more international races) and told Honda's Robert Clarke a few months ago he'd "had it" with CART -- the series he and Pat Patrick started in 1979.

Additionally, Penske's longtime backer, Marlboro, yearns to get back to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and to Nazareth. Current tobacco legislation makes cigarette brands choose only one series with which to advertise, and Nazareth is the closest market to Marlboro's headquarters in New York and now a stop on the IRL schedule.

Ganassi, who is exploring the possibility of purchasing a current CART team so he can take Target to the IRL in 2003, is a member of CART's board of directors and seems likely to remain in CART if he can swing it.

It's hard to imagine defending CART champ Gil de Ferran and 2001 Indy 500 winner Helio Castroneves wanting to run an all-oval series like the IRL, but they may have to go wherever Penske choses.

Of course the kicker in all of this is that Toyota has yet to commit to building CART engines in 2003 and beyond -- regardless of whether both open-wheel series have the same rules.

"I think they're in," said Rahal, whose team currently competes with Ford motors. "Look at all the engines they could sell at Indy alone."

So let's assume Toyota does continue in CART with normally-aspirated engines. It certainly won't provide 300 engines (the total it takes to supply 27 cars with this season) and has no interest in competing against itself.

So, if Toyota takes care of a third of the CART field as it does today, who will supply the rest of the power without Honda or Ford?

Can current IRL manufacturers General Motors and Nissan step up production and supply CART teams? Are they interested?

GM's Joe Negri told Curt Cavin of the Indianapolis Star that his company had no interest in CART, but it's hard to imagine either General Motors or Nissan turning down paying customers, especially considering the lack of funded teams in the IRL.

Rahal and some other CART owners believe this is the first real step towards something resembling a unified series, but Tony George, despite the economic climate of open wheel racing and this country, has given no indications he wants any part of unification.

Even though he wreaked havoc on the Indy 500 and open wheel racing by starting the IRL in 1996, his league did develop an engine plan and stuck with it. And now he has CART playing his game.

Replacing Honda's efforts won't be easy, and CART is now hoping (praying?) that the IRL's manufacturers can rescue them for 2003.

In the long run, going to normally aspirated engines may be the best thing for open wheel racing and, considering its options and most of its partners, CART probably did the right thing.